Ladies' Day at the Capitol: Women Strike for Peace Versus Huac

Swerdlow, Amy

doi:10.1515/9783110971095.685

Cited by 2 publications

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“…It frequently encountered pointed patriarchal critiques and successfully fought extravagant charges of communist infiltration by the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1962. 83 WSP's founding members and "key women"-politically astute and experienced in social activism-understood the importance of crafting a moderate, maternal image to stymie such criticism. 84 In this sense, at least for public relations, WSP adopted similarly limited expectations for its activists' behavior as the press and the general public.…”

Section: Wsp's Complicated Sympathiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“I Have Chosen the Flaming Death”: The Forgotten Self‐Immolation of Alice Herz

Coburn¹

2018

Peace & Change

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In March 1965, 82‐year‐old peace activist Alice Herz immolated herself in opposition to US military action in Vietnam. Her protest followed similar public displays by Vietnamese Buddhists, but was an unprecedented form of protest in the United States. However, while it provoked sympathy from international observers, the US public reacted with ambivalence. Herz's legacy subsequently became overshadowed after Norman Morrison's identical protest in November that year. This article accounts for the multiple reactions to Alice Herz's forgotten self‐immolation. It examines both the international and domestic context to highlight the cultural norms, political context, gender dynamics, and performative factors that influenced responses to the act. Using Morrison's example to show how responses were formed, this article reveals that because Herz did not receive contemporary interest she has been overlooked historically.

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Section: Wsp's Complicated Sympathiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“I Have Chosen the Flaming Death”: The Forgotten Self‐Immolation of Alice Herz

Coburn¹

2018

Peace & Change

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“…When subsequently summoned before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC), established to identify political subversives, they invoked supposed gender differences between the masculine and feminine mind to deflect their male interrogators' questions and justified their activities on the basis of a maternalist, and thus purer, form of patriotism. 11 The 1930s was a watershed for consumer activism, as politicized consumers, outraged by the egregious injustices of the Great Depression, shifted direct challenges to the market to the center of the political economy. Consumer protest tapped a vein of popular discontent, as radicalized women and their male supporters mobilized to demand state intervention in the markets that had failed so dramatically.…”

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confidence: 99%

A Mighty Power against the Cost of Living: Canadian Housewives Organize in the 1930s

Guard

2010

Inter. Labor Working-Class Hist.

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Consumer activists organizing in the 1930s against rising milk prices demonstrated the power of a strong grassroots movement to enlarge prevailing understandings of the political and to wring responses from an unwilling state. Their maternalism, combined with milk's emotional, social, and political meanings, attracted broad popular support and deflected criticism from the dairy industry, hostile public officials, and anticommunists. Their campaign for affordable milk became a synecdoche for broader demands that the state restrain business in the interests of consumers and protect ordinary people from the harsh injustices of the Depression. After winning immediate concessions, the Toronto Housewives Association failed to achieve their long-term goals, but their impact was nonetheless significant. Their campaign fueled and informed public debates about the political economy of food and government's responsibilities to protect citizens, pushing socialist policies onto the political agenda under the cover of maternalism. Participation in Housewives' campaigns transformed powerless victims into effective political actors. Housewife-activists challenged prevailing notions of normative feminine behavior, creating social space for ordinary women acting within their domestic roles to engage in direct political action.

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Ladies' Day at the Capitol: Women Strike for Peace Versus Huac

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

“I Have Chosen the Flaming Death”: The Forgotten Self‐Immolation of Alice Herz

“I Have Chosen the Flaming Death”: The Forgotten Self‐Immolation of Alice Herz

A Mighty Power against the Cost of Living: Canadian Housewives Organize in the 1930s

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